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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28677786">everything goes away, everything goes away</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/immolationfox/pseuds/immolationfox'>immolationfox</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>king and court [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Feels, Autistic Richard Gansey III, Autistic Ronan Lynch, Friendship, Gen, Richard Gansey III is a Good Friend, Ronan Lynch Loves His Friends, Ronan Lynch is Bad at Feelings, ronan and gansey are friends the way brothers are friends</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 06:34:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,297</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28677786</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/immolationfox/pseuds/immolationfox</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>gansey is leaving, and ronan does not want to say goodbye. </p><p>...</p><p>
  <i>“I’m coming back, you know,” Gansey said at last.</i>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Richard Gansey III &amp; Ronan Lynch</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>king and court [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1628434</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>36</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>everything goes away, everything goes away</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>ive been suffering in gansey &amp; ronan friendship hell for the past like two weeks</p><p>title from always gold, by radical face</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Today was the day. Today was the day Ronan had been trying to avoid because Adam had already left for Harvard last week and he didn’t want anyone else to leave-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well,” said Gansey, in his Gansey way. “That’s the last of it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Henry and Blue were arguing over the luggage at the back of the dream Pig, the bright orange car’s nonexistent engine idling and obscuring Henry and Blue’s bickering which also meant it was obscuring Gansey and Ronan’s nonexistent conversation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ronan made a noncommittal sound in his throat and keep fiddling with the leather around his wrists. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gansey sighed and through his periphery, Ronan watched him take off his glasses and rub his eyes, and then rub his lenses with the hem of his shirt. It was a t-shirt, blue and grey stripes with a pocket over his heart. It was the most casual thing Ronan had seen Gansey wear outside Monmouth or the Barns. Even at his parents house, Gansey seemed to wear business-casual. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m coming back, you know,” Gansey said at last. Ronan kicked a lose chunk of gravel across the parking lot. “I mean it, I’m not leaving you forever.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You might as well,” Ronan said after a moment. His throat felt thick and tight, like he couldn’t breathe or speak. “Now’s your chance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jesus, Ronan,” Gansey snapped, and that surprised Ronan enough that he jerked his eyes up to Gansey’s. Gansey was staring a furious hole into the neckline of his shirt. “I am not leaving because I want to get away from your company. For Christ’s sake, you were my roommate. I </span>
  <em>
    <span>like </span>
  </em>
  <span>you around.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mostly,” Ronan shot back. “It’s not like I made it easy for you. God knows I didn’t even want to be around and I sure tried my damnedest!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You said that was a dream thing!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Dreams come from my own head, you dumbass!” Ronan snarled, unable to keep his voice low anymore. He wanted to put his fist through the wall. Fuck but Gansey pissed him off sometimes. His stupid fucking earnestness and relentless optimism and his inability to cut his losses and move on. What the fuck. Who was actually like this. Not even to mention how he could barely seem to fathom that Ronan and the others would die for him, in the most literal sense, but he was too fucking good and self-sacrificing to allow anyone else to. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gansey blinked. He opened his mouth. Shut it. Ronan could almost see him sorting through words in his brain and assembling by hand the next sentence that was about to come out of his mouth. Ronan turned his head and squinted into the sky to give him time. He missed Cabeswater. He missed Adam. He missed Noah. He didn’t want to miss Gansey, too, or even Henry and Blue, he tacked on, grudgingly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Whether or not you made being best friends easy isn’t something I take into consideration when choosing my friends,” Gansey began slowly, “because if it was, I would not be friends with you, or with Adam, or with Blue, or with Henry. I do not stay with my friends because it is easy. I stay with my friends because they are </span>
  <em>
    <span>my friends.</span>
  </em>
  <span> And because even when the relationship we have between us becomes difficult or someone fucks up, we put in the effort to fix it. No!” Gansey said quickly, when Ronan tried to interrupt. “Please do not interrupt me. I know you, Ronan, goddammit, and the least you could do is let me acknowledge it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Abashed, Ronan ducked his head and stared at the ground. Gansey exhaled, pinched the bridge of his nose. He drew closer so he didn’t have to shout over the Pig.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s not how I wanted this to go,” Gansey muttered to the concrete parking lot. He fell silent. Ronan didn’t say anything. “I’m going to miss you. A lot.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Everything Ronan wanted to say, and couldn’t, or should say, but didn’t, rose from his lungs and clogged his throat and he couldn’t speak. He snapped his jaw closed, and held it tight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I wish you could come,” Gansey said next, so quietly Ronan wasn’t sure he meant to say it, or that he was meant to hear. The tangle of words in his throat swelled at the rush of emotion from his stomach. If he doubled over, maybe all the things he couldn’t say but felt would vomit themselves to Gansey’s feet and he could see.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shit,” Gansey said next, the one syllable word sounding awkward in his mouth. His hands hovered by Ronan’s cheeks, as if he wasn’t sure he was allowed to touch. “You’re- I didn’t mean to-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wet. His face was wet. Fuck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where’s Cheng and the maggot,” Ronan whispered, hoarse like he’d just screamed, like he’d torn his throat open. The only words that could force themselves through. Gansey blinked rapidly, looked over his shoulder.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“In the car, looking at the map.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ronan yanked Gansey by the elbows to his chest and pressed his nose into Gansey’s shoulder. Gansey’s arms came up and wrapped around Ronan and squeezed. He was leaving. He was going to leave and go all the way across the country and he wouldn’t be there when Ronan couldn’t sleep and he wouldn’t be there to get orange juice together at 2 am, and he wouldn’t be there when Ronan just wanted to sit in silence after a nightmare, and he </span>
  <em>
    <span>wouldn’t be there.</span>
  </em>
  
</p><p>
  <span>Ronan let himself feel everything, all at once, for those few moments he hugged Gansey, too tight, too unwieldy, too inexperienced in displays of brotherly affection. He let himself drown in it, burned his lungs in it. Then he let go and shoved Gansey off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If you ever tell anyone I hugged you, they’ll never find your body.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gansey ignored the tears of his cheeks, and Ronan ignored the redness of Gansey’s eyes when he shot back,</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ll be the first suspect. Now, where’s your phone?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ronan blinked at the change of subject. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Phone…?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>He grabbed it out of his back pocket and held it out on his palm. Gansey reached for it, but instead of taking it, he covered the phone on Ronan’s palm with his hand, and then wrapped the other around the back of Ronan’s hand, Ronan’s hand and his phone completely protected by Gansey.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Keep it charged. You can text me. Or not. But I’ll text you. Just- let me know you’re okay, every once in awhile,” Gansey said, and for the first time in a long while, Ronan heard a note of pleading in his voice. When would Gansey learn that Ronan could never actually tell him no, and mean it. He nodded. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gansey withdrew his hands. Ronan pocketed his phone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well. Farewell,” Gansey Gansey-ed. He held out his fist. As he bumped it, Ronan drawled,</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Excelsior</span>
  </em>
  <span>, you bastard.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Someone honked the horn of the pig. They both looked to see Blue hanging out the passenger-side window, one hand cupped around her mouth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re going off-schedule!” Blue warned in a shout. Ronan watched as Gansey’s eyes widened with a great amount of amusement. He still flipped her off.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s for stealing my best friend!” he shouted back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Blue collapsed into the passenger seat laughing and Gansey turned bright eyes back to Ronan. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Seriously. We’ll keep in touch,” Gansey said warmly, leaning to bump Ronan’s shoulders with his own, and then he turned and walked away. Something began clawing its way up Ronan’s throat again and he could feel the urge to isolate himself in his bedroom from everyone except his dreams creeping into his mind again, but -</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gansey turned, at the driver’s side door, and waved.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wasn’t leaving him. Ronan wasn’t being abandoned.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ronan lifted a hand.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
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